Like Dylan in the 80s

Call me a heretic, but I consider Bob Dylan to be something of a prophet. Think about it: the man sees the world with astounding clarity (not to mention verticality) and shares that vision with others in ways that are as inspired as they often are perplexing. And he’s done so without compromise or deference to fashion. Well, at least, minimal deference to fashion (exhibit A, left).

Nowhere is this more evident than in his work from the 1980s, a period unfairly maligned as his most uninspired. I’m talking specifically about his post-Gospel, pre-Oh Mercy/Wilburys “wilderness period,” a time when he seemed genuinely at drift, both personally and creatively, an observation which his autobiography confirms. That the light kept on shining, albeit in a slightly obscured way, is a testament to the Bob’s genius – or simply more evidence in support of The Nazareth Principle. In fact, it’s the obscura factor that makes this period so fascinating, the glimpses of inspiration that those “with ears to hear,” i.e. the true believers(!), couldn’t help but notice. I’ll never forget borrowing the Bootleg Series Vol.1-3 boxed set from the library and discovering, much to my surprise, that almost all of the best songs on it were from the mid-1980s, none which ever made it onto an album. Many artists have stuff in the vault which is as good as the stuff they released (e.g. Springsteen, Ryan Adams, MJ); very few have any “lost songs” that legitimately and consistently surpass the official stuff. In fact, apart from Dylan and The Beach Boys, I can’t think of any other examples. Why didn’t he release this stuff?! Given what he was putting out, it didn’t make sense. That is, unless Dylan were operating on a whole different level than us mere mortals… Another layer to the Dylan-onion presented itself.

Before listing the songs to support these claims, it’s worth sharing two particularly pertinent quotes, both from this period (when he was supposedly “over” his born-again phase):

1985: “We’re all sinners. People seem to think that because their sins are different from other people’s sins, they’re not sinners. People don’t like to think of themselves as sinners. It makes them feel uncomfortable. ‘What do you mean a sinner?’ It puts them at a disadvantage in their mind. Most people walking around have this strange conception that they’re born good, that they’re really good people – but the world has just made a mess of their lives… But it’s not hard for me to identify with anybody who’s on the wrong side. We’re all on the wrong side, really.”

1986: “Well, for me, there is no right, and there is no left. There’s truth and there’s untruth, you know? There’s honesty and there’s hypocrisy. Look in the Bible, you don’t see nothing about right or left… I hate to keep beating people over the head with the Bible, but that’s the only instrument I know, the only thing that stays true.”

16 Great Dylan Songs from the 80s

Every Grain of Sand – Shot Of Love [1981]. This one’s been covered to death, but for good reason. Of the two versions, I prefer the “perfect finished plan” one on the Bootleg Series, for obvious reasons.

Brownsville Girl – Knocked Out Loaded [1986]. Eleven minutes and somehow not a wasted moment. Co-written with Sam Shepherd, it contains a few of Dylan’s greatest lines: “You always said people don’t do what they believe in/ They just do what’s most convenient, then they repent/ And I always said, “Hang on to me, baby/ And let’s hope that the roof stays on.”

Band Of The Hand – Band Of The Hand Soundtrack [1986]

Silvio – Down In The Groove [1988]

Death Is Not The End – Down In The Groove [1988]. “The tree of life is growing/ Where the spirit never dies/ And the bright light of salvation shines/ In dark and empty skies.” Amen.

Related

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“Religion is represive to a certain degree. Religion is another form of bondage which man invents to get himself to God. But that’s why Christ came. Christ didn’t preach religion. He preached the Truth, the Way, and the Life. He said He’d come to give life and life more abundantly. He talked about life, not necessarily religion.” (7 Dec. 1979 KMEX Radio)

I and I, with its brilliant tweaking of the Rastafarian phrase
Man of Peace, a spiritual thriller with one killer line after another
and
Neighborhood Bully, with its simple, irresistible riff of Sly and Robbie’s, and sardonic lyrics – again, one zinger after another – that are actually a defense of Israel

From Oh, Mercy:

Political World (“We live in a political world / Everything is hers or his”)
Everything is Broken
Ring Them Bells
What Good Am I?
and my desert island pick of the lot
Man in the Long Black Coat, a meditation on fate and conscience and an indirect affirmation of personal responsibility
(“There are no mistakes in life some people say/ It is true sometimes you can see it that way /
But people don’t live or die, people just float / She went with the man / In the long black coat”)

Ken- I had a feeling you’d catch that omission! And right you are to point out those beautiful tunes on Oh Mercy. Still, as much as I hate to trip you up on a technicality, that’s precisely what i’m going to do! As stated in the preamble, i was thinking of Dylan’s “80s wilderness period” as following the explicity Born Again phase, and preceded the Oh Mercy/Wilburys one (which I would classify as a distinctly new Dylan epoch…!). So Shot of Love through Down in the Groove or 1981-1988. If i’d included Oh Mercy (1989), it would have been hard not to put every song on there! Man in the Long Black Coat especially… Love that tune. Any other unreleased gems or collaborations from this period that I should look at? I wish “Jammin Me” with Petty was stronger…

“Series of Dreams” was recorded with Daniel Lanois in New Orleans in ‘89 for “Oh, Mercy.” (I was once given a tour of Lanois’ Canal Street studio, under the delirious delusion that the record was recorded there and not on Soniat Street). Bob has played it live only once, at Wolf Trap in ‘93. As for unreleased gems, there are none known. “Julius and Ethel” – yes, about the Rosenbergs – is worth a listen as a curiosity, but the lyrics are uninspired and the melody is minimal. But I might as well wander off topic again and mention that Bob recorded several songs he didn’t write during the Infidels sessions. The real beauty among them is a duet with former squeeze and back-up singer Clydie King on the Willie Nelson ballad “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground.”

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[…] Stones Cry Out by DZ on Apr 16, 2009 • 6:57 pm 2 Comments As Michael Jackson in the 90s, Dylan in the 80s, or post-Smiths/-Viva Hate Morrissey would attest, an unsung or widely defiled period of a great […]

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